Charlton had spoken in a joking manner, but she’d seen the certain truth of it in her brother’s face, the broken nose and gapped smile, the raised, purple ridges on his arms and legs where flesh had been knitted back together. Jamie had watched Charlton as he and Matt walked to the log truck with its busted headlights and crumpled fender and cracked windshield. A truck no more beat-up and battered than its owner, Jamie had realized in that moment. Charlton was thirty years old, but he moved with the stiffness of an old man. Dr. Wesley in Seneca said he needed back surgery, but Charlton would hear nothing of it. Her sister-in-law, Linda, had told Jamie of nights Charlton drank half a bottle of whiskey to kill the pain. And sometimes, as Matt had witnessed, Charlton didn’t wait until night.
The porch swing creaked as Jamie pressed her head closer to Matt’s chest, close enough so she could not just hear but feel the strong, sure beat of his heart. First get the house fixed up, Jamie thought. Then when that was done she and Matt would start taking night classes again at the technical college. In a year they’d have their degrees. Then good jobs and children. It was a mantra she recited every night before falling asleep.
“Want to get in the lake?” Matt asked, softly kissing the top of her head.
“Yes,” Jamie said, though she felt, to use her mother’s words, tired to the bone. In some ways that was what made their lovemaking so good, especially on Saturday nights — finding in each other’s bodies that last ounce of strength left from their long day, their long week, and sharing it.
They walked down the grassy slope to where a half-sunk pier leaned into the lake. On the bank they took off their clothes and stepped onto the pier, the boards trembling beneath them. At the pier’s end the boards became slick with algae and water rose to their ankles. They felt for the drop-off with their feet, entered the water with a splash.
Then Jamie was weightless, the water up to her breasts, her feet lifting from the silt as she wrapped her arms around Matt. The sway of water eased away the weariness of eight hours of standing, eased as well the dim ache behind her eyes caused by hurry and noise and cigarette smoke. Water sloshed softly against the pier legs. The moon mirrored itself in the water, and Matt’s head and shoulders shimmered in a yellow glow as Jamie raised her mouth to his.
THEY SLEPT LATE the next morning, then worked on the house two hours before driving up the mountain to her grandmother’s for Sunday lunch. Behind the farmhouse a barn Jamie’s grandfather had built in the 1950s crumbled into a rotting pile of tin and wood. In a white oak out by the boarded-up well, a cicada called for rain.
“Let’s not stay more than an hour,” Matt said as they stepped onto the front porch. “That’s as long as I can stand Linda.”
Inside, Jamie’s parents, Charlton, Linda, and their children already sat at the table. Food was on the table and the drinks poured.
“About to start without you,” Linda said sharply as they sat down. “When young ones get hungry they get contrary. If you had kids you’d know that.”
“Them kids don’t seem to be acting contrary to me,” Matt said, nodding at the three children. “The only person acting contrary is their momma.”
“I’m sorry,” Jamie said. “We were working on the house and lost track of time.”
“I know you all are trying to save money, but I still wish you had a phone,” her mother said.
Grandma Chastain came in from the kitchen with a basket of rolls. She sat down at the table beside the youngest child.
“Say us a prayer, Luther,” she said to her son.
For a few minutes they ate in silence. Then Charlton turned to his father.
“You ought to have seen the satinback me and Matt killed Wednesday morning. Eight rattles and long as my leg,” Charlton said. “Them chain saws have made me so deaf I didn’t even hear it. I’m just glad Matt did or I’d of sure stepped right on it.”
“Don’t tell such a thing, Charlton,” Grandma Chastain said. “I worry enough about you out in them woods all day as it is.”
“How’s your back, Son?” Jamie’s mother asked.
It was Linda who answered.
“Bothers him all the time. He turns all night in bed trying to get comfortable. Ain’t neither of us had a good night’s sleep in months.”
“You don’t think the surgery would do you good?” Grandma Chastain asked.
Charlton shook his head.
“It didn’t help Bobby Hemphill’s back none. Just cost him a bunch of money and a month not being able to work.”
When they’d finished dessert, Jamie’s mother turned to her.
“You want to go with me and Linda to that flower show in Seneca?”
“I better not,” Jamie said. “I need to work on the house.”
“You and Matt are going to work yourselves clear to the bone fixing that house if you’re not careful,” her mother said.
Jamie’s father winked at Jamie.
“Your momma’s always looking for the dark cloud in a blue sky.”
“I do no such thing, Luther Alexander,” her mother said. “It’s just the most wonderful kind of thing that Jamie and Matt have that place young as they are. It’s like getting blackberries in June. I just don’t want them wearing themselves out.”
“They’re young and healthy, Momma. They can handle it,” Charlton said. “Just be happy for them.”
Linda sighed loudly and Charlton’s lips tightened. The smile vanished from his face. He stared at his wife but did not speak. Instead, it was Grandma Chastain who spoke.
“You two need to be in church on Sunday morning,” she said to Jamie, “not working on that house. You’ve been blessed, and you best let the Lord know you appreciate it.”
“Look at you,” Linda said angrily to Christy, the youngest child. “You got that pudding all over your Sunday dress.” She yanked the child from her chair. “Come on, we’re going to the bathroom and clean that stain, for what little good it’ll do.”
Linda walked a few steps, then turned back to the table, her hand gripping Christy’s arm so hard the child whimpered.
“I reckon we all don’t get lucky with lake houses and such,” Linda said, looking not at Matt but at Jamie, “but that don’t mean we don’t deserve just as much. You just make sure your husband saves enough of his strength to do the job Charlton’s overpaying him to do.”
“I reckon if Charlton’s got any complaints about me earning my pay he can tell me his own self,” Matt said.
Linda swatted Christy’s backside with her free hand.
“You hush now,” she said to the child and dragged her into the bathroom.
For a few moments the only sound was the ticking of the mantel clock.
“You don’t pay Linda no mind,” Charlton said to Matt. “The smartest thing I done in a long while is let go that no-account Talley boy and hire you. You never slack up and you don’t call in sick on Mondays. You ain’t got a dime from me you ain’t earned.”
“And I wouldn’t expect otherwise,” Matt said.
“Still, it’s a good thing Charlton’s done,” Jamie’s mother said as she got up, “especially letting you work percentage.” She laid her hand on her son’s shoulder as she reached around him to pick up his plate. “You’ve always been good to look after your sister, and I know she’ll always be grateful, won’t you, girl?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Jamie said.
The bathroom door opened and Christy came out trailing her mother, her eyes swollen from crying.
“We ought to be going,” Matt said, pushing back his chair. “I need to get some more shingles on that roof.”
“You shouldn’t to be in such a rush,” Grandma Chastain said, but Matt was already walking toward the door.